Why was it that every time he found himself at the cliff of his emotions, there would always somehow be an apple to try and make him feel better?

I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters.

Draco's Retreat

Playing with his new toy broomstick in the courtyard, young Draco Malfoy waited for his mother's sweet voice to call him inside for supper.

The Malfoy Manor stood majestic in the outskirts of the village, strongly protected to keep the filthy Muggles away.

The sun set slowly behind what Draco saw as a home more enormous than it actually was. He kept his eyes on the setting sun as his broomstick moved on its own, taking him forward. He held his head up, smiling at the orange sky, still, his broomstick moved forward. When he finally turned his head to see where he was going, he found himself swiftly approaching the trunk of a tree; so quick he hadn't enough time to think and steer away.

Next thing he knew, he was lying on the grass after having collided with the tree. He opened his eyes. Just when he thought it was all over, an apple had fallen from the tree and hit him hard on the forehead.

Though his father had always told him that a Malfoy must never shed his tears, Draco couldn't help but cry out loud for his mother.

Narcissa rushed out of the house and ran to her son the moment she saw him crying on the ground.

"Shh, it's okay," she whispered to him, holding him in her arms, embracing him and kissing his little head, but Draco continued crying.

Narcissa took the fallen apple and wiped some dirt off of it with her dress. "Let us go inside, love. I'll wash this shiny green apple for you and slice it up for you to eat, so it can make up for that bruise it's given you. What do you say? Would that be alright?"

Draco's sobbing quieted down. He nodded slowly. And gently, he got up and walked into the house hand in hand with his mother.

…

"Father, could you—" Draco stopped in his tracks before he could enter his father's room. He was about to ask for his father's assistance in climbing the tree in the courtyard to pick an apple, however, he had heard his father speaking to someone else.

He peeped into the room through the small opening in the door and saw no one else inside.

"The Dark Lord has not been sighted in five years, Yaxley," his father said angrily. "You can't expect every single one of us to continue with this nonsense, knowing he's been defeated by a child no older than my six-year-old son!"

Draco took a step forward, hoping to see with whom his father was having this intense conversation. In his attempt to do so, however, he didn't notice himself slowly pushing the door, making it creak, catching his father's attention.

"Draco!" His father's voice pierced through his ears. "What do you think you're doing here, eavesdropping on an important conversation I'm having for work?"

Other than his father's loud, raging voice, the face Draco saw in the fireplace frightened him so much that he found the need to run away from both the room and his father.

He ran to the courtyard and sat under the tree, wrapping his arms around his knees. He'd always known his father to be a strict, serious man, but he had never seen him that angry before. He closed his eyes to try and calm himself down, but the image of his father and the scary man in the fireplace had been etched upon his memory for his escape.

His eyes shot open, realizing that present time, right there in the courtyard, was safer than his thoughts for now.

He wiped his eyes of the little tears as he saw their big-eyed house elf standing behind a nearby tree.

"What?" Draco scowled at him.

"Nothing, sir," the house elf covered himself even more with the trunk of the tree, afraid Draco might throw something at him. "Dobby couldn't help but notice the young master showing signs of fear. Dobby wants to know if the young master is alright."

"Of course I'm alright, stupid elf," Draco looked away.

"Does Dobby's young master need anything, sir?" Dobby asked shyly.

"No," Draco snapped. "Don't you have food to cook or dishes to wash?"

"Dobby has finished all his work for the afternoon, sir," Dobby said, still from behind the tree. "Dobby would like to help his young master with whatever he needs."

Draco thought about it and wanted to shake the thought away. How stupid he would look, working together with a house elf. But he had no choice, his mother had gone out to see her sister in Azkaban, and his father was furious with him. So with shame in his voice, he said, "help me pick an apple from this tree."

"Of course, sir!" Dobby lit up.

Moments later, Dobby found himself carrying Draco on his shoulders as he reached up for an apple.

"Sir, Dobby thinks it would be better if Dobby climbed up the tree instead. Dobby could easily do so and pick an apple for the young master." Dobby said, hoping Draco's perfectly healthy body wouldn't crush his thin, fragile elf bones.

"No," Draco said flatly. "I need to get it myself."

"If you say so, sir," Dobby winced.

After several failed attempts of getting his hands on an apple by standing on the poor house elf's shoulders, Draco finally agreed to have Dobby pick one for him.

"Not that one, it's all spotty," Draco shouted to Dobby who had succeeded in climbing the tree. "The one to the right of it."

"That's it!" Draco exclaimed, jumping up and down in excitement.

Dobby pulled the apple from the tree and kept it in his pocket. On his way down, he had missed a branch and fell from the tree, hitting the trunk and a few branches on his way down.

Draco ran to him with a concerned look on his face. Dobby looked up and showed Draco the shiny green apple. "No bruises, sir." Dobby smiled, obviously pertaining to the apple in hand, as opposed to himself who was covered in bruises and cuts.

"Brilliant!" Draco took the apple from Dobby's shaking hand and ran back into the house, leaving Dobby and his big sad eyes on the ground.

…

"Hi, Draco," a cheerful voice came from the back door of their house as Draco struggled to climb the apple tree.

"Nymphadora." Draco glared at her.

"Don't call me that," she balled her fist.

"What am I supposed to call you then, if not your name?" Draco asked, still trying to reach for an apple.

"Tonks."

"You mean your Mudblood father's name?" Draco sneered.

"Hey! Watch your mouth, kid!" Tonks grabbed the back of Draco's vest and pulled him off the tree trunk.

"Let go of me!"

"Not until you apologize, you stuck-up ten-year-old!"

"Fine! Then I'm sorry." Draco said and Tonks put him down and turned her back to him, walking back into the house.

"Sorry that you stink like Muggles and Mudbloods. Poor Hufflepuff girl." Draco's high-pitched cocky voice blurted out.

Tonks quickly turned around and grabbed him by the collar. "Take that back."

"Why should I?" He smirked.

"Take it back!" She yelled in his face.

Draco stared at her for a moment, and slowly started crying until his soft sobs turned into a loud wail.

"What is going on here?" Narcissa came out of the house with Andromeda.

"Oh, goodness," Narcissa pulled Draco away from Tonks.

"Andromeda, I want you to leave at once," Narcissa said scornfully. "Your coming here with your husband has caused us enough trouble. And to think your daughter has been attacking my son!"

"Honey, please apologize," Andromeda quietly said to her daughter.

"Why? He started it!" Tonks argued.

With the look Andromeda was giving her, Tonks needn't hear what more her mother had to say. She stomped towards the tree Draco had been trying to climb earlier and ascended it herself, taking an apple without any difficulty. She jumped down and walked back to everyone in a quick pace. She held the apple out in front of Draco's small face.

Draco smiled and took it immediately.

"Say thank you, dear," Narcissa instructed him. But without a word, Draco went into the house and into the kitchen where he could ask the house elf to wash the apple for his cheerful devouring.

Tonks rolled her eyes at her cousin's immaturity and arrogance.

…

Although Draco has been looking forward to getting sorted into Slytherin, he dreaded the day he had to leave for Hogwarts, especially after his father wouldn't stop going on about how horrible the headmaster was.

"Anything from the trolley, dear?" A plump old lady broke the silence in his compartment. Draco looked at her, shook his head, and turned to look at the moving scenery once again.

Once the lady pushed her trolley of sweets away, Draco stood up to take something from his trunk. After moments of rummaging through his things, he pulled out a glassy green apple. He sat back down and took a bite from it; its sour yet sweet taste reminding him of home.

"Mind if we stay in here?" A large boy stuck his head into the compartment's sliding glass door.

Draco shook his head and, again, turning to stare out the window.

"I'm Vincent Crabbe," the boy said.

"Gregory Goyle."

"Pansy Parkinson."

They all introduced themselves as they placed their trunks on the overhead shelves and took their seats.

"Draco Malfoy." Draco said, shaking hands with each of them and, once again, shutting the world out as he ate his apple and enjoyed the view of the distant mountains and clouds.

…

Draco's train companions may have naturally accepted his handshakes, but a certain four-eyed boy found it in himself to deny the same gesture from him. Moreover, insulting Draco's pride.

"Who does he think he is?" Draco threw himself on the couch in the Slytherin Common Room. Draco had finally been sorted into Slytherin, much to his satisfaction. "Stupid Potter. Parading around Hogwarts with that scar, thinking he can mess with anyone he wants because of it."

Draco couldn't tell for himself what it was he was feeling. Sadness? Anger? Jealousy?

Whatever it was, all he needed right now was a taste of home, so he took a bite of his apple, and everything felt better in an instant.

…

Hoping he could catch just a moment of flawed teaching from the giant so his father could get him fired, Draco swept his way to the front of the crowd.

"Everyone," Hagrid announced. "This is Buckbeak. A Hippogriff."

Hearing his classmates' shrieks and screams at the sight of the ugly creature, Draco smirked. If a teacher released such a wild beast in front of the cowardly students, Hagrid was sure to be sacked soon.

Draco couldn't have been more delighted. Drowning in his glorious thoughts, he happily ate his apple—subconsciously being careful enough not to swallow his pride along with the sourness and sweetness that complemented his sense of slow victory.

…

The Vanishing Cabinet hadn't been working. Every visit he made to the Room of Requirement, he'd hoped it would work that time. And again, and again, and again until it had failed him for the nth time.

Draco had spent the past several months scared—of what he had to do and of what would be done to him if he failed. He spent some several nights silently crying, begging no one in particular for it all to be over. But every single day was similar to the last—disappointing. It made him lose hope, wondering if he'd be able to escape all this fear that had endlessly been growing in him and slowly eating him up.

The thought of failure had been etched onto his mind for weeks, leaving him even more hopeless than the moment he had been informed of his task. Until the very day he'd considered returning to the retreat he'd known all these years, his idea of an escape from everything he'd considered cruel—green apples.

After lunch at the Great Hall, Draco took an apple from the Slytherin table and quickly made his way to the Room of Requirement. He had originally planned on consuming it to calm himself down, but the thought that maybe, as strange as it may sound, the moment he had an item that quieted his thoughts, he would finally get things right.

After doing a little bit of mending on the Cabinet, Draco put his wand away and took the apple from his pocket. He held it to his lips and shut his eyes for a moment, praying as hard as he could to whoever and whatever gods existed that he had succeeded this time around.

He pulled the Vanishing Cabinet's door open and left the apple on the hard wood, hopefully looked at it for a moment, and closed the door shut. Seconds later, he opened it once more, slowly. Much to his relief, it had disappeared. All he had to do then was wait.

After a few minutes of waiting, he heard a faint sound from inside the Cabinet. Draco stood up and slowly opened it. There, he saw the same apple he had left inside earlier. He bent over and took it.

Holding in his hand a bitten apple, Draco released a heavy sigh of grateful relief.

…

"Well?" Bellatrix's face was inches away from Draco's. Sitting in front of them was a boy who was about Draco's age. His deranged aunt and a few snatchers were convinced this boy was Harry Potter, though still in need of Draco's opinion.

"I can't be sure," Draco said. He then saw a confused look deep inside the boy's eyes, beneath the distorted facial features.

…

The boy was Harry Potter, and Draco knew. Why he didn't say so was beyond him as well. It didn't matter now though, because he had escaped with his three friends, Ollivander, their old house elf, and a goblin.

Draco now sat on their manor's old apple tree—on a branch he could only dream of reaching when he was little.

He was confused and scared. Not knowing what to do or how to deal with the mess his family was known to have caused, he sat there, away from everything, hoping he'd only have to get down from there when he knew everything was over.

Who knew when that would be?

He looked up and saw an apple hanging above him. He reached out to grab it and leaned his back on the trunk of the tree. He rested his head back, gripping the apple tightly as his hand hung from his sides. He held another hand over his face. This time, he knew this simple apple wasn't going to help. His uncertain fear had taken over him, so much that not even thoughts of his childhood and his home, nor the mixture of the amazing sweetness and sourness of this fruit, could calm him down.

Hopeless as everything was, Draco sat there silently, ignoring the seeking calls of his mother from inside the house. Sorry for all he'd done wrong, Draco held the apple to his chest and cried silently.

…

Back at Hogwarts where everything started, Draco sat in the ruins of the Great Hall, watching his fellow students cry over their dead friends. Voldemort had called off the fighting and asked for Harry Potter to see him in the Forbidden Forest. Although after years of calling him a coward, Draco knew Harry Potter would go to Voldemort, even though he knew it might cost him his life.

So all everyone could do was wait.

Draco sat beside Goyle who had been weeping over Crabbe's sad death for hours. As horrible as Draco felt about everything that had happened for the past twenty-four hours, he couldn't find it in himself to grieve over the deaths of his friends. So he did all he could do—sit and keep quiet.

"Apple, dear?" Madame Pomfrey asked.

"What?" Draco looked up at her.

"It's not much, but it's few of what we have left, really," she said. "Eat up, Mr. Malfoy. We all need it."

Draco took two apples from the basket and handed one to Goyle. He looked up at Madame Pomfrey and gave her a small nod as his thanks.

Why was it that every time he found himself at the cliff of his emotions, there would always somehow be an apple to try and make him feel better?

…

"Here," Draco handed a small apple to his son.

"But green apples are sour," Scorpius frowned.

"Can't do anything about that," Astoria smiled. "They're your father's favourite. He won't take red ones, or grow them for that matter."

"Fine," Scorpius pouted and took the apple. "If I finish this, I get to climb the tree, right?"

"Whatever you want."

"Brilliant!" Scorpius jumped in excitement, running to the tree outside their house and sitting on its roots, eating the apple as quickly as his little mouth would let him.

…

Draco sat in his study, deep in thought, and looking back on his life. And he realised he hadn't exactly been the most pleasant person.

"Knock, knock," his wife's sweet voice came from the door. "I brought you some apples so you could take a break from work."

"Thank you," Draco smiled. "You could leave them here."

"I'm going out to buy some things Scorpius needs for school," Astoria said as she headed out of the study. "He's in his fourth year, can you believe how fast everything's going? Word's even come out that he fancies Ron and Hermione Weasley's daughter, Rose."

Draco just smiled and gave off a light laugh.

"Anyway," she said, straightening herself up. "Do you need anything while I'm out?"

"No," Draco said. "Thanks."

"All right, then," she clapped her hands together. "I'll be back by six."

"Great," Draco turned his chair around to face his desk. And a sudden thought occurred to him.

"Astoria!" He called out to his wife.

"Yes?" She leaned back to look in through the door again.

"Could you get me the owl? I have some things to send out."

"Of course, dear," she smiled once more, and made her way out.

Draco remembered everyone he had been horrible to, and even everyone he felt he had caused trouble.

So he was sending out apples to every single one of them. To his parents, for being a pain to them as a child. To Dobby the house elf, for physically injuring him, and for being extremely ungrateful for his selflessness. To Teddy Tonks, for being a horrible cousin to his mother. To Gregory Goyle, for being a horrible best friend to him. To Hermione Granger, for calling her a Mudblood countless of times. To the Weasleys, for discriminating them. To Harry Potter, for being an arse to him for seven years. And so on.

Despite the fact that these people may not share the same memories as Draco did for apples, he was sending these out because he felt the need to share the fruit that had brought an endless means of escape for him in the past. And not just to share to anybody, but to every life he knew he might have made miserable at one point.

From the extremely carefree day Draco hit that apple tree in the Malfoy Manor's courtyard with his toy broomstick, up until the day he thought he'd lost himself—and all the days of sadness, anger, jealousy, confusion, and fear in between—he had found himself one true friend; a love whose sweetness and sourness mixed together could perfectly complement his very feelings.

As crazy as it may sound, Draco held strong sentiments for green apples.

Author's Notes: As big a fan as I am for the crack Drapple fanfics, I felt the need to write a serious one, mainly because I fail at writing crack. XD

I almost didn't want to finish this because of how long it was ending up to be. I was actually planning on a maximum of 1,500 words, but I guess 3,000 isn't so bad. Hahaha! :P

Reviews? :D

Ridley Silverlake

PS: Is anyone else upset that "Apple" disappeared from the list of characters in the HP character list here on FFN? D:

Edit: Oh God. I just watched Prisoner of Azkaban again and realized I should've included a part here after Hermione punched Draco in the face. XD Oh well. :P